


the gaps have a way of catching up

by carpenter



Category: Merrily We Roll Along - Sondheim/Furth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-17
Updated: 2017-09-17
Packaged: 2018-12-30 23:09:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,621
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12119247
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carpenter/pseuds/carpenter
Summary: Mary and Gussie, talking after the end (before the beginning, if you prefer).





	the gaps have a way of catching up

**Author's Note:**

> I saw a thing and it made me angry because there is no reason for these characters not to have thoughts about each other, so I fixed it a little bit. (This happens to me a lot; it may become an occasional series.) Gen, sorry. Unbetaed.

Almost 40, Mary thinks, and still making a fool of myself at parties. The editor instinct kicks in: making a fool of myself _differently_ at parties. At 25, she would have been mortified to drink enough to throw up behind a Bel Air mansion (well, that's cheating — she's mortified now, but she's pretty sure no one else could tell), and she would have kept the commentary track inside her head rather than choosing to spill it all over the living room.

Well. She never has to come back, and isn't that a blessing. To do list, tonight/tomorrow: finish being sick, stand up without falling over, walk back to hotel, get on airplane, never speak to Frank Shepard again. If she's honest (and she's usually honest; how she daydreams about Frank... _daydreamed_ about Frank... is an aberration), that probably means never speaking to Charley Kringas again either. Charley would say he loves her, but what he really loves is having someone to do the work of pushing Frank back to him, of pushing him to give Frank one more chance. For 15 years, she was the first one to put her hand out, but that's all over. How many times has Charley called her up, or even returned her calls, since the NBC taping? Damn few.

They did their best, she and Charley, she thinks. But Frank only ever really wanted to be loved by the world. He needed his name in lights; he was never going to be able to hold out for the tiny light cast by their small circle, by Beth, by his kid. Frank was still young, still a little baby-faced and innocent, when Gussie dangled that first string, but the path led to everything he'd ever wanted, and he knew it.

Gussie knew it too. She'd pulled all the strings and aimed straight at the target of where they all were right now, as if she knew how it was going to turn out and it was still the best outcome she could think of. _They really do deserve each other._

* * *

Mary has progressed to standing, and her legs are getting steadier. The ocean breeze is pleasant (obviously the view would be flawless from Gussie's house), and she thinks the slight bobbing of the anchor lights offshore is caused by wave motion rather than by her vision.

The door slams, and Gussie appears. To Mary's astonishment, she's shaking (or maybe that's the bourbon again). Gussie's eyes adjust to the darkness, and she notices Mary.

"What's the matter, too drunk to fall into the ocean and put us all out of our misery?"

"A little," Mary admits. It's a peace offering, and she doesn't know why she says it. Well, she does know why — Meg. Gussie is still shaking. She looks... angry? guilty? disheveled? None of those words belong in the same sentence as Gussie Carnegie; this scene was written by a hack.

Gussie looks out at the ocean, trying to get her breathing under control, and that tells Mary what must have happened.

"So he left you after all," she says, not especially kindly. "What did you do about it?"

Gussie laughs, her tinkling cocktail party so-sorry-i-would-never-have-done-that-on-purpose laugh, but with a weird tinge of hysteria. "I threw iodine in Meg Kincaid's face. She's in there screaming now."

"...what?" is all Mary can manage. She has no doubt Gussie is evil enough to pull off any scheme no matter who gets hurt, but this doesn't sound like a scheme. It sounds suspiciously like losing her cool.

Gussie speaks again, quieter. "I physically attacked a poor stupid girl whose only crime is believing she's face-to-face with the best future a poor stupid girl can possibly have, who's five years away from understanding it'll never last, that she'll be left with nothing."

Oh. "I'd give it ten. He's getting older." Gussie does laugh at that, almost a real laugh.

"Can I tell you something true about me?" Gussie asks, quietly again.

"I've never in my life been able to stop you from doing anything you wanted to do."

"I thought I could get away with it," she starts. Mary wonders if this is Gussie lying and pretending to be honest or Gussie being honest and pretending to lie. It makes her head hurt again.

"It was a long con. He was exactly what I needed, for the life I knew I wanted, for the life I knew I deserved. And he wanted it too, so badly. I thought he'd be grateful to me for giving him that; I thought he'd stay in the end."

"That was pretty stupid, even for you. You should have had a plan." Mary tries to regain her wits. To say she does not like this woman is an understatement verging on the absurd. She has wasted decades because of this woman. Well, because of Frank. Well, because of herself.

Gussie scowls. "Now it's your turn. You have to tell me something true."

"Fine," Mary doesn't have the energy to not have the energy for this. "I was jealous of you. Oh, not because of Frank. And certainly not because you're a terrible human being." Gussie winces slightly at that, unprecedented again, but she's had a worse night than Mary has, and Mary has intentionally blown up a 20-year friendship, so there we are.

Mary ignores it. "Because I could never have been you. I couldn't work a room, or attract the glittering mobs. I never wanted that; it's shallow, it's boring, it's stupid. But it's also a skill, and you're a world expert. And I couldn't get a second book contract."

"Huh," Gussie says, so apparently Mary has given away an actual hostage.

"What, you thought I became a critic because I ran out of things to say? You never thought about it at all, more likely. He certainly never did. America's golden boy; he'll put me on an airplane so I can come adore him in person, but did he ever offer to make a few calls?"

"You never asked." It isn't a question, and Gussie looks amused.

"No, of course not. And, you're right, it's two sides of the same coin. He only thought of me as someone who loved him, not as an artist. And I was ashamed to ask for a career favor when I should have been ashamed to waste my time on him."

Gussie winces again. It's getting sort of annoying.

"For god's sake, Gussie, if you start blubbering I will throw you into the ocean myself. Take 30 seconds to pull yourself together, then maybe you can explain why you deserve any sympathy whatsoever after how you've treated the rest of us all these years." Mary looks pointedly at her wrist, even though the face of her cheap digital watch isn't visible in the dark and doesn't show seconds anyway.

"Technically, you're on my property," Gussie points out reasonably. "Anyway, I don't intend to snivel around looking for sympathy. I'm not Beth."

"Really. That's the best you can do?" Honestly, women like Gussie are why they can't have nice things. "You think your life is going so much better than Beth's these days?"

"I can't imagine otherwise."

"You can't imagine much. For your reference, Beth the pathetic shouldered through the old boys' network and came out with a law degree from Baylor. She's back in Manhattan now, putting Frankie through prep school. When we have lunch, she always pays - she made $200 grand last year."

"I guess it's always the quiet ones," Gussie says, sounding impressed despite herself.

"Say, she does family law. I could put you in touch. She probably wouldn't even gloat; it is Beth, after all."

That earns Mary another laugh, and Gussie admits, "I don't think _my_ pride could stand that. But I'll let you know."

"Think of it as a challenge. Walk away from this, do as well as she has with what you get, or picture us laughing at you over lunch."

"Is that what you're planning to do, go back to New York and gloat because I got what I deserved?"

Mary's eyes widen. "I know that was not an apology."

Gussie is silent for just a moment. "No, but this is. I thought I could win against him, but I just wound up hurting everyone else in our lives. And I'm sorry." 

Mary wonders what Gussie will do after tonight. Find another genius protege for her socialite act. Get a real agent and try to make the jump from starlet to actress. Retire to the midwest and terrorize a bridge club. Keep the house, and wither away trying to relive a bunch of empty promises?

"It's okay. It pains me to admit it, but you were set up just like the rest of us. Look, here's my card." Rifling through her purse looking for her glossiest business card (from the magazine she writes for the third-most-often), Mary realises she's almost entirely sober now. She can leave.

"I won't cry if I never hear from you again. But if you need anything from an old enemy, call. And whatever you do, don't keep the house. Make something of yourself. You owe us all that much."

Gussie accepts the card with a smile, slight and hopeful and non-predatory and nothing like Gussie's smile. Mary hopes she doesn't regret this offer later, because she won't be surprised if Gussie does call.

What a strange night it's been. Mary turns away and walks towards her hotel, leaving the glitz and the mansion and the bobbing anchor lights on the gorgeous ocean along with the idiotic 20-year-old dreams of the young. She can't wait to get home, back to the life ahead of her.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Fall Behind Me" by the Donnas, a song which is intermediate between MWRA canon and the conversation I'd like to see, in that MWRA canon does not even bother to show us Mary despising Gussie - she's just there for the audience to despise - much less go on to asking whether that makes any sense.


End file.
